How can I be useful, of what service can I be? There is something inside me, what can it be?
Vincent Van GoghRead
And when I read, and really I do not read so much, only a few authors, - a few men that I discovered by accident - I do this because they look at things in a broader, milder and more affectionate way than I do, and because they know life better, so that I can learn from them.
Interpretation
Reading allows us to gain broader perspectives and learn from those who understand life better.
In this quote, Vincent Van Gogh expresses his appreciation for the authors he reads, stating that their broader and more affectionate perspectives on life provide him with valuable lessons. He acknowledges that by engaging with the thoughts of a few carefully chosen writers, he can enrich his own understanding of the world and learn to view it from a different, more compassionate angle.
In practice
In a book club discussion, I might use this quote to emphasize the importance of diverse perspectives in literature.
How can I be useful, of what service can I be? There is something inside me, what can it be?
Describing Starry Night: Firmament and planets both disappeared, but the mighty breath which gives life to all things and in which all is bound up remained.
To express a marriage of two complementary colors, their mingling and their opposition, the mysterious vibrations of kindred tones.
Great things do not just happen by impulse, _x000D_ but as a succession of small things linked together.
The world concerns me only in so far as I have a certain debt and duty to it, because I have lived in it for thirty years and owe to it to leave behind some souvenir in the shape of drawings and paintings – not done to please any particular movement, but within which a genuine human sentiment is expressed.
To believe in God for me is to feel that there is a God, not a dead one, or a stuffed one, who with irresistible force urges us towards more loving.
He who has nothing—it has been said many times—has nothing to lose but his chains.
Be present. I would encourage you with all my heart just to be present. Be present and open to the moment that is unfolding before you. Because, ultimately, your life is made up of moments. So don't miss them by being lost in the past or anticipating the future.
The one important thing I have learned over the years is the difference between taking one's work seriously and taking one's self seriously. The first is imperative and the second is disastrous.
Very few men are wise by their own council, or learned by their own teaching. For he that was only taught by himself, had a fool for a master.
I believe in order that I may understand.
When you're on your own, you have all the self-censorship that everybody has when they try and write. All the little voices that say, 'No, you can't write that, what will they think of that?'
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.